Month: October 2016

I lost a pretty large number of files recently when I moved them from my DropBox to my desktop, not realizing this was going to make them disappear from my DropBox. The computer I had at the time was later stolen, so I then lost them off of my desktop. One of the files that I lost was the original 2011 score to my song Ode to the Universe. I did not lose the mp3, only the musical score from which the mp3 was ripped. If you want to hear what it sounds like, go right ahead:

“Ode to the Universe” from Eden in BabylonCopyright 2016 by Andrew Michael Pope. All Rights Reserved.

Usually, when a file is “misplaced,” I spend laborious hours searching for it. Moreover, I curse myself for having been so sloppy. Furthermore, I won’t rest until I find it. Not so, this time.

Somehow last night it dawned on me that, as I endeavor to create the 2016 version of Ode to the Universe, it’s actually a good thing that I have misplaced the earlier file. Now I won’t be tempted to draw upon any aspect of that file in producing the more mature version as it has evolved in my mind throughout the past five years. As I worked on this version last night, I found myself very thankful that I was diligently starting from scratch, rather than trying to work off of a previous, premature, primitive version of this piece. I even have the older mp3 to scrutinize, to try and determine just how and where it is primitive and premature, so that I can reverse those charges in the present day.

The fact that I was able to let go so easily of this substantial loss further confirms that I am on the right track with my project. If I know God, He’ll probably cause the older file to show up right at the exact moment I’m done with the new one. Then again, I may not know God very well.

Because this blog is supposed to be about the creative process and how it fits into my spiritual perspective, I must report that I had another mysterious experience of affirmation and synchronicity that validated, for the time, my path.

As I probably have mentioned many times, I wrote a number of tunes “in my head” while I was walking about the notorious college community in which I once attempted to live. I had no computer in those days, and I’ve never been very good at writing by hand. So I kept track of all the different parts in my mind and resolved that when I was better off I would obtain a computer and notate the music using my Finalesoftware. One such song is Bubbles Taboo.

If you bothered to click on that link, you no doubt noticed that it led to a song of standard studio length, approximately three minutes long. But it was supposed to involve both a lengthier introduction and a substantial instrumental break prior to the recapitulation of the main theme. I just hadn’t gotten around to sequencing those sections at the time.

The instrumental break involved many modulations– so many that I had never even bothered to count them until tonight. Their number is twelve. Observe:

C – G – F – C – Bb – F – G – A – G – D – G- C

See? Twelve separate keys. (Now some of those keys might be more majory than minorish, but since they’re all bluesy, I left out those details. If you’re a musician, you probably understood that statement. If you are not a musician, you probably aren’t reading this blog.)

Not only did I have no idea how many modulations were involved, but I also had no idea what key I was going to wind up in. But look: I wound up in the same key – C – from which I started. Now what are the chances of that? Since there are twelve tones in the chromatic scale, the chances are one out of twelve. In other words, the odds are eleven to one against it.

If you don’t believe me, check it out. The break with the twelve modulations takes place between 3:50 and 5:00 on this 5:36 clip.

See? It lands on the same key it started on, the key of C, after all those modulations. Ir could have landed on any other key – but it landed on C, against the odds. But that’s not all.

What are the chances that the number of keys in the break would be the same number as the number of pitches in the scale; that is to say, the number twelve? Or that the mystic-laden break would end at exactly 5:00, for that matter? Quickly, things becomes astronomical.

Although there is a chance that it is all a coincidence, isn’t there a far greater chance that this was on some level the process of elegant unconscious creative incubation, or – better yet – a manifestation of divine principles? I hold the latter to be self-evident. Music, as I will attest to my dying day, is a Manifestation of the Divine.